


Autistic Hornet

by Schnikeys_Discuss (Schnikeys)



Series: Clockie's Meta [12]
Category: Hollow Knight (Video Games)
Genre: Analysis, Archived from radioactivesupersonic Blog, Character Analysis, Gen, Nonfiction, Originally Posted on Tumblr
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-06
Updated: 2019-03-06
Packaged: 2021-03-09 00:53:49
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 626
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27055987
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Schnikeys/pseuds/Schnikeys_Discuss
Summary: "Okay reading your posts on ghost and you made a comment about how hornet reads autistic- Im /dying/ to hear you expand on that! Maybe its cause everyone in hk is well... Like That i didn't any vibes but i'd love to hear you share!"
Series: Clockie's Meta [12]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1974223
Kudos: 9





	Autistic Hornet

**Author's Note:**

  * For [ClockworkRainbow](https://archiveofourown.org/users/ClockworkRainbow/gifts).



Anonymous asked: Okay reading your posts on ghost and you made a comment about how hornet reads autistic- Im /dying/ to hear you expand on that! Maybe its cause everyone in hk is well... Like That i didn't any vibes but i'd love to hear you share!

* * *

Hornet is very curt and very self-contained. She speaks in an incredibly matter-of-fact manner, with slightly stilted, elegant turns of phrase. She’s young, relatively speaking- of the same generation as Ghost- but there’s something rather stodgy about the way that she talks, if you compare her to more breezily spoken individuals like Bretta, Elderbug, or Cornifer.

If you get the King’s Brand before dispatching Herrah, there’s a scene I consider rather significant to Hornet’s character where she returns to Deepnest and waits for you to wake up, and talks to you. At one point, she clearly reacts to Ghost giving her an odd look, and remarks,

“…What? You might think me stern but I’m not completely cold.”

This is the biggest, most telling thing of my read on Hornet as autistic- she’s someone who ordinarily keeps her emotions maintained behind an unintentional cold facade, and, aware of this, she feels the need to clarify she does feel, actually- her grief for her mother is completely sincere and even knowing she had no intention of stopping Ghost, that this had to be done, she still ventured back to her childhood home and, while briskly and formally, asks for Ghost to leave her alone to grieve.

If you talk to Cornifer in Greenpath, he’ll mention that Hornet ran straight past him without looking back. Almost no other NPC mentions Hornet, besides the Hunter’s remarks in his Journal and the preview comic with Quirrel, which both either reference or depict fleeting and rather hasty, hostile encounters.

The picture this paints is that Hornet rarely talks to people, often preferring to avoid them unless she feels like there’s something important she has to say or do to them. If that’s the case, she’ll only talk as long as her business seems like it warrants, and then leaves. The sense of ‘what’s important’ she’s chasing here has no factoring in whether or not she’s being rude- but she also lacks the sense that she’s knowingly and deliberately being rude. It seems much more like Hornet is merely concerned with stating what she sees as the truth, and communicating clearly and honestly, and might even be slightly taken aback or frustrated if this behavior was called as “rude”.

The glimpses we’ve seen of Silksong so far also seem to imply an introverted character to Hornet; the first shot of her in the cage has her seemingly shaking, quietly, without moving or trying to thrash or grab the cage, as she sits in place before she lashes out. This could be a breakdown, it could be being jostled by her environment, it could be merely she spent a long time Focusing to charge up that enormous thread blast, or a combination of them all.

Also, unlike Ghost, Hornet appears to keep a quest journal of specific objectives sorted by their function. The idea of her as someone who takes meticulous note of things would suggest she spends a lot of time putting her thoughts down in writing and, with the implication she really does not talk to people on anything she doesn’t see as business, would further imply a certain isolated character. This may mean that despite being fully voiced, conversations in Silksong will have a certain monologue-like angle to them similar to Ghost’s- because just because Hornet _may_ comment, and probably will at least a few times, doesn’t mean she particularly wants to have this conversation, and it’s easier to just listen for pertinent information.

**Author's Note:**

> Analysis originally found here: <https://radioactivesupersonic.tumblr.com/post/183280484435/okay-reading-your-posts-on-ghost-and-you-made-a>


End file.
